


Blue Box in the Oblong Office

by thewritehag



Category: Discworld - Terry Pratchett, Doctor Who
Genre: Gen, Self-Insert
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-24
Updated: 2017-01-24
Packaged: 2018-09-19 15:21:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,655
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9447329
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thewritehag/pseuds/thewritehag
Summary: For funzies and self-indulgencies.





	

Empty. Time and existence halted in this particular room when it was empty. A thick carpet spread out inches from the bookshelves that lined the walls, but for the large window and its drapes. A large, modest desk near the back with two chairs in front of it, each one small and deliberately positioned. There were a few decorations, but this was a space made for time to stand still. Until a sound like light percolated against the walls. 

It was like picks bypassing the locks of time, steady and thorough, louder and louder. Existence in the gnash and rasp of it, as if it had always been there and no one could notice unless it creeped upon them. The ceiling and floor, if they were sentient, would wish they could have shaken with it, just to relieve the pressure.

Gasping in its revolutions, the sound gave way to a shape. A blue box flashing in and out of existence more solid with each revolution. The single bright light on its top spun in time with its noise when, suddenly, both stopped and simply Were. The blue box stood in a back corner of the long and narrow room as if it had always been there and space moved around it, not the other way around. This blue box, door opening in a swift motion inward, contrived to fit in and the woman stepping out of it contrived do the exact opposite. 

She whipped her bright hair around her head, the feel of fresh air pleasant on the sides of her head, and looked back at the man who walked past her, spun on his heel, arms wide open and fingers splayed. 

“I told you,” he said, grinning wide enough to make his bald head look as if an egg cracked open to reveal teeth and tongue, “Ms Holly from among the bones of giants! Here we are, the greatest city on the Disc.” 

He punctuated the last syllable with a stomp and looked around the whole of the room, sparing a long glance out the massive window looking out over the sister cities of Ankh and Morpork. He let his hands drop and suddenly pointed at her.

“You said I couldn’t do it.”

Holly laughed, once and short. All breath, testing her lungs, more like, and went to the window, acknowledging his declaration with a bobbing nod. 

Her mouth fell open as she looked directly out over the city and toward another tower, and second massive tower just beyond it. She focused back on the window itself above her and grinned to see the grimy clouds skirt against the highest panes. She looked up at the Doctor when he joined her, thinking to quirk one eyebrow when she was really raising both.

“Great as in size, right? It is big.”

“Oh, both.” The Doctor nodded. “Big. Wonderful, too, depending on the street you’re on and what time you’re on it. 

Holly conceded the point with a snort.

“So, what building are we in?”

“We are in the venerable Tump Tower,” he said, as formal a diplomat as any, but for his ensemble made entirely of black leather and a purple t-shirt. “Over there,” he pointed, “is the Patrician’s Palace—if we wave, maybe he’ll see us—and you know that’s the Tower of Arts.”

“That’d be a thing,” Holly said softly. “Why didn’t we land on it?”

“Magic,” he said shortly. He turned slightly, looking at shadows building behind the TARDIS. “Hello.”

“Huh?” Holly asked, not looking at him. 

“Not talking to you.”

“HELLO. JUST LOOKING.”

The Doctor pressed his lips together and nodded, then turned back to the window.

“Who were you talking to?”

“Have a guess?”

Holly looked over her shoulder. 

“I guess it’s a good thing I can’t see anyone else.”

The Doctor chuckled and she moved from the window to inspect the room they stood in. 

“This is fantastic,” she said, voice bubbling and loud, feeling every pitch of it in her body. She touched the fabric wall paper until she met with a book case and its odds and ends. Her fingertips danced over the brass casing of a telescope tucked away on the top shelf. Their office dweller is a peeping tom with an excellent vantage point.

Probably the best one in the whole city, Holly thought. Her smile ached, but she couldn’t stop.

“That’s my line,” the Doctor called from further away, doing his own inspecting on the other side. 

He promised he could show her what the World-Builders made, to see the one her favorite builder put together. Holly dabbed away the tears gathering and forced herself to pay attention to where she was. 

She resisted the pull to join him and look at what he is no doubt pawing, but strived to no longer be the tagalong she always was on adventures, no matter how small. Instead, even as she found a curious crevice between designs on the wall with her thumbnail, she went to the large and simple desk. 

The chair was big, made of red leather, and—she found when she sat—not at all comfortable. Overstuffed at the back and under the thighs, just the kind to promote good posture and consistent study. Holly leaned forward and inspected the papers, quills, and the inkwell without touching. 

“Hmm,” she said and was only slightly caught off guard when the papers were whipped from under her nose by the Doctor, who had no compunction to do otherwise. 

“What was that?” He asked.

“Huh?” Holly picked up one of the quills and spun the tip against her finger. “Nothing. I was wondering whose office we’re in.”

“We’re checking,” he said cheerfully. 

Holly laughed and opened up the drawers on either side, some giving way to show more papers and replacement inks, what looked like a chew toy, and a silvery sharp letter-opener. 

“What I’ve found with World-Builders,” he said and made sure to catch her eye, “is the worlds they build do what they want.”

“If they did it right,” Holly agreed. “I always thought that some could be good enough that their creations would get up to stuff their makers didn’t even think of for them.”

The Doctor met her eye again, smiling slowly. 

“Exactly.”

“So, what are you saying, Doctor,” she said and tried to lean back, but winced instead, “that we’ve discovered where Rincewind hides when being a professor is too much for him?”

“Do you see him here now? No, but maybe the Librarian has a double-life as an executive,” he said and went back to flipping through the pages. 

She suspected it was a ledger of some sort. Lines and lines of names and numbers, a few of them monetary. Holly stood again, tired of what was certainly a device that was specific to getting information by targeting one’s glutes and kidneys via deep muscle torture. 

Quill still in hand, twirling it against her skin, alternating fingers and palm. She walked around the TARDIS, glanced out the window as she walked slowly passed, and took to enjoying the odd portrait and iconography. When she got there, she was tempted to open the office’s main door and have a look outside, when she was caught by a mysterious sound on the other side.

She leaned her ear against the door, her hand hovered over the latch, and listened. It was a clock ticking, but. Not. Quite? She was arrested by it, eyes widening as she understood.

Tick, tock. Ticktocktick. Tock. Tick. 

Fudge.

“Time to go,” Holly said and almost tripped while she swiftly jogged back to the desk, looking over her shoulder all the while, her hair getting caught in her mascara. She, as much as her shaking hands let her, placed the quill back where she found it and filched the papers from the Doctor’s hands, replacing them, too. 

“Oh, come on!” He said way too loudly, “I’m still looking and no one’s coming.”

Holly opened her mouth and heard shouting from somewhere else, but still too close. 

“Yes,” she hissed and ran around to shut the still open drawers, “there is.”

He looked at her, head cocked to the side and brow furrowed, while she tried not to panic and looked for other exits. There was another door behind some thick curtains and another hidden behind the wallpaper, she remembered.

Fudge, she thought and wished fervently she could’ve been able to scream expletives if only in her own brain. 

“Maybe it’s Ridcully with a double-life?” The Doctor offered, his glee belying any real curiosity. “Maybe he and Granny live here and this is his office. I’ve solved it!”

“Fanboy,” Holly muttered while he was practically bouncing. She went and pressed herself against the side of the bookshelves near the furthest side of the window, then tried to slide along its front toward the front door. 

When she got to the doorframe, thankfully made of thick timber and artfully, distractingly carved, she swung her eyes to the Doctor and found him tracking her movement with dancing eyes after he perched himself on top of the desk. 

Fudge. Her heart arrested in her chest, breath stopped. 

Footsteps. More than one pair. 

“Fudging, fudge,” she whispered, lips and mouth suddenly very dry. 

Two pair? She thought, Gods, three???

She flattened herself closer to the wall and sucked in her stomach. 

Voices. The shouting one, a calm one, and one like ice. The Doctor kicked his heels against the desk front, the TARDIS—as big as the World Turtle—over his shoulder. 

“I’ll catch up at the Watch House, huh?” Holly said and the door opened. The Doctor nodded and waved her goodbye happily. 

Nothing for it. One-two-three!

“Lord Vetinari! Commander! Captain,” Holly heard the Doctor boom as she ran headlong towards the nearest open doorway, skittering to avoid Drumknot and Mr. Fusspot back from walkies. “It is a pleasure, I’m the Doctor.”

**Author's Note:**

> ;D


End file.
